Habersack, Sabine - Puşcaş, Vasile - Ciubotă, Viorel (szerk.): Democraţia in Europa centrală şi de Sud-Est - Aspiraţie şi realitate (Secolele XIX-XX) (Satu Mare, 2001)
Ivo Samson: Security Policy of the Slovak Republic: Meeting NATO Criteria before Madrid and after Washington
Ivo Samson to the Statements cited above, but also as military-security attributes of classic neutrality or "positive" neutrality, or "dynamic" neutrality41, have lost their sense in present day Europe. In global politics, one does not expect a revival of antagonisms of any character. The new model of collaboration of the world and European economical and military political groupings assumes (and this is the aim of general globalization of economic and political life) a steadily deeper knowledge and scientifically substantiated prognostic outcome of strategic partnership between the subjects.42 And finally, there is another, also essential argument. Even based on a gross pragmatic viewpoint, a lively discussion is being led in all the neutral States on the simplest way, and above all in a constitutional legislative form, to get rid of neutrality, which is very costly, and morally and politically obsolete. The alternative No. 3: Security of Slovakia based on the security policy cooperation with Russia is not a pessimistic, but a catastrophic scenario for Slovakia and the support of this scheme in Slovakia is minimal. In the past, the nationalist Slovak government repeatedly used the security co-operation with Russia more as a means of blackmailing the West than as real option. The first alternative, far from being easily realizable in the future, seems to be the only realistic one despite the astonishing negative attitude of the Slovak population. The response of the society to the security integration will depend on the deepening of the security links among other European nations. The weakening of the position of the European "non-aligned countries" (particularly of Austria) might have a decisive impact on Slovak society. In this respect, the Slovak public opinion is very "elastic". After the Washington Summit in 1999, the Slovak security and foreign policy has continued to steered to the full NATO membership. As the most suitable instruments for reaching this goal, a range of activities toward both NATO as a whole, and, bilaterally, NATO member countries has been regarded. In 1999 - 2000, 25 official documents representing the Ministry of Defense of the SR and NATO's partners were signed (3 at the level of presidents, 3 intergovernmental agreements, 8 agreements concluded directly between the Slovak MoD and respective partners in other countries, 11 agreements that were concluded by an authorized 41 These notions occurred as parts of East-West relations during the mid-nineties. 42 Russia, NATO, see The Founding Act - Paris 1997. 204
